Lingering
by lychee loving
Summary: It takes a few moments of watching her move from her closet to the open luggage on her bed to realize that she was not packing - she was taking carefully folded clothes back to her chest of drawers. (Post-Schism, but pre-AvX.)


_this is set right after the Schism arc back in 2012, after Scott took the initiative to go to Storm's room to ask her to stay with his team on Utopia. She'd been in the middle of packing bags to join Wolverine when Scott convinced her that she had to stay and be the conscience of what would become Cylcops' Extinction Team._

* * *

**Lingering**

Once the decision to split the team had been finalized, Logan did as Scott, gone around Utopia to find out who exactly would be staying on this hunk of floating metal, and who would be returning to New York with him. There were several X-Men who were on the fence about leaving, he knew, so he stopped by those first. Saved the ones he was sure were on his side for last.

Not his best decision.

Unlike her attic loft in the mansion, Ororo had been given a room like everyone else's on Utopia. It was a standard size: not small by any means, but it certainly did not have the spaciousness that her loft once had. Logan stood just outside her doorway, hands in his pockets, watching her move about the room. He'd always enjoyed watching her, even when she did the most menial of tasks. Grace and power hidden in the simplest of movements.

It takes a few moments of watching her move from her closet to the open luggage on her bed to realize that she was not packing - she was taking carefully folded clothes back to her chest of drawers.

His mouth hangs open in shock for only a heartbeat. A growl comes forth in the next second.

"You're _staying_."

Ororo barely glances up. She'd known he was there for some time now, but chose to wait for him to make his own conclusions.

"First Jubes, now you, too?" An ominous _snikt _accompanies his words. "_Why_?"

Jubilee, staying? That was news, to Ororo. But unlike Logan, she was hardly surprised. "You know Jubilee better than anyone, Logan. When has she ever willingly chosen an academic environment over the life of an X-Man?"

He growls low in his throat, and when Ororo finally turns to face him she sees his fists clenched tightly at his sides.

She gives him a tiny, sympathetic smile. "Let's take this outside, shall we?"

* * *

She still surprises him, after all these years.

The moment they step outside, Ororo takes him by the forearms and calls forth a burst of uplifting wind. There was nothing quite like flying with Storm, so he savors the few seconds they're in the air together. _Might be the last time for a while_, he figures bitterly, his good mood soured by the reminder of what they were about to talk about.

She finds an empty roof to deposit themselves on.

"I find that it is easier to speak to you outdoors, my friend," She says, once she alights beside him. "You've always listened better like this."

"I meant to go with you, you know," She continues, voice quiet, when he doesn't speak up. "But I am needed here. You do not need me, Wolverine."

_Bullshit_, he wants to say, looking at her incredulously. "It's always been you and me, Ro." _I've always needed you in my corner._

She gives him a funny smile, and wants to tell him that that was a lie. Instead she asks, "And when have I ever been comfortable as a teacher, Logan?" They both knew that the last time the mansion had served as a legitimate school for young mutants, in the days before M-Day, Ororo hadn't stayed to teach in the capacity that he or Jean had. "In the meantime, Scott needs me here on Utopia to keep things from falling apart."

He growls low in his chest at the mention of Summers. She quells the urge to lay her hand on his arm to calm him; they shouldn't be touching.

"How long have known each other now, Logan? It has been so many years. This is hardly the first time the team has separated." She gives him a vaguely amused smile. "It is not as if we will never see each other again, after all. We're allowed visits and phone calls aren't we?"

He calms down some, allowing a ghost of a smirk to grace his lips at her light teasing. But he still isn't happy, damn it. "But c'mon 'Ro. This is Cyke. Cyke, over me? I'm hurt, darlin."

It's a joke, but it isn't.

Her own lips twist into something between a smirk and a smile. "It's never been a question of where I want to be, my friend, but where I am needed."

Logan snorts. Like they haven't had this song and dance before. "That why you're here and not with the Panther in New York?"

Her brows furrow, startled and thrown off by the sudden change in topic. "I beg your pardon?"

"How long's it been since you saw him, 'Ro? He still playin' Batman in Hell's Kitchen?"

"Not that it is any of your business, but T'Challa has asked specifically for me not to involve myself with his affairs in Hell's Kitchen for the time being." She feels a pang even as she says those words, because not too long ago she would not have had any trouble telling him this.

Logan scowls, crossing his arms across his chest and speaking up before he realized he had things to say. "Tch. You deserve better, darlin. Someone who'll let ya be there for him regardless of duty and honor, and vice versa. Someone you can stand beside."

Ororo is silent a moment and stares out at the horizon. "... But I did try for better, Logan. Better did not seem to want me." She glances back at him with a smile that doesn't quite reach her eyes. "Better had those he loved so fiercely, that I would never..." _Measure up, never match_... she hates the way her voice has hushed, the way her heart hurts. She'd thought she'd overcome all these feelings years ago.

"... 'Ro." His voice is a gruff, hoarse whisper, long since used to reading between the lines when it came to this woman before him.

She blinks once, the wetness in her eyes is gone. When she turns back to face him, it's with the detached expression of the All-Goddess. Logan swears under his breath, because he hates that look.

"I am staying, Wolverine. For a number of reasons. Foremost of which, perhaps, is because now more than ever it is important for us to rise above what we want to see to the needs of others." She moves to stand, intending to leave.

But he grabs her wrist. "We ain't done here yet, 'Ro,"

She disengages her wrist from his hold with practiced ease, lifting her hand to rest against the whisker of his cheek for a heartbeat.

She looks at him with softened, beseeching eyes, her firm words gentled by the tone of her voice. "We're done for now, Logan. That does not mean it will be for forever." She smiles at him fondly. "Good luck with the school. I am sure that somewhere out there, Jean is inordinately pleased at your choice of name."

_It wasn't fair_, Logan thinks as she flies away. For her to put him in a bind like that and then up and leave. He thinks (been doing a lot of that lately) about this divide, about why he's splitting up the team, about the school he's about to open, and then the woman he's naming it after, the woman who he thinks on more than he should. And then about the woman who just left, and how it feels like she'd taken his heart with him.

It wasn't fucking fair, he thought viciously. He and 'Ro, they _had _tried for something. But he hadn't known she thought of it as "better" Had he known...

He slammed a fist into the reinforced steel of the roof he sat on, thoughts flying. They'd been dating, almost officially, if you could put a name to that. There had been kisses, dates and exclusivity. He remembers that time fondly; a step into further strengthening their relationship, in an entirely new capacity. But they didn't have a chance to put a proper name to whatever it was they had, and would never get to. M-Day robbed them of that chance as suddenly there were more important things to worry about. He went one way and Ororo went on hers, except hers led to Africa, where her fight on behalf of her fellow African mutants would lead her to one Wakandan king.

The next time they would meet would be her wedding day.

It wasn't fair.

But who could blame her, he had thought, back then. Only 'Ro could show up one day, engaged to be married to a king. He'd said she married well but married beneath her, goddess that she was. In that vein, he probably couldn't even hope to hold a candle. He thought he never stood a chance, so he let it go. And how could he, a monster whose last shreds of a human heart were supposedly taken by a dead woman who loved another even claim love someone like Ororo when he was who he was?

And now she goes around throwing words like that?

He closes his eyes, thinking back on it. Remembers the way her breath had caught so briefly as she spoke, the tears that she blinked away as quickly as they came.

_Better did not seem to want me._

_Christ, 'Ro, _he thinks, hands clenching into fists. _If you only knew._

He wishes he had a cigar to light, to chase away the scent of sandalwood and rain that Ororo has left behind.

* * *

_continue, y/n?_


End file.
